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“It’s early. What was your plan for the rest of the day?”
Reed walked up alone. Jason hadn’t come with him. “Whatever we had planned, Chicago, is off. You’re our one and only priority now.”
She shoved her suitcase into his chest and smiled. “Good to know. Make yourself useful, cowboy, and put my bag in your truck.”
Reed’s eyebrows shot up and then a big smile spread across his face. “It’s going to be fun being your bodyguard.”
Nicole shook her head and shut her eyes. “One week. Only one week. I can handle this.”
“And we can handle you, Chicago. You’ll see.”
“Reed, shut your mouth. Nicole is our guest. Stop teasing her.”
“Sure thing, bro.” Reed swung her suitcase into the bed of their truck. Then he opened the door. “Officer, if you please,” he said in a mocking British accent.
She snorted but didn’t say a word in response. She got into the truck, sliding past the steering wheel to the center of the cab.
Reed got in the driver’s side of Maude and he took the passenger seat.
They headed out of town together.
The whole drive, she sat staring straight ahead with her hands on her knees. Touching her on the chin earlier had him hard as a rock, but this was no time to let his cock do his thinking for him. She needed him to be better than his best, and he silently vowed to himself that whatever it took to be that man, he would. No woman had moved him in that way before.
He wanted to hold her, to tell her everything was going to be okay, to kiss her until the hurt he sensed in her vanished for good. The load she carried was heavy. He could see it in her eyes, hear it in her words, even feel it around the false façade of toughness she presented. Of course, she was tough. Tougher than most men. She’d nearly had Jason on the ropes back at Phase Four. That was something to see.
He glanced over at her as Reed turned off the main road and through the cattle guard at the southern entrance to Stone Ranch. The firm set of her jaw told him a storm of doubt and confusion was brewing behind her big brown eyes.
Sawyer wanted to reach her somehow. This had to be difficult for her. It would be for any woman. She and Jason had told them about the error on the missing persons report and her suspension. She’d come to Destiny to clear her name. Now she was headed up a mountain with two strangers and the Russian mafia was coming for her. “Difficult” fell short of what she had to be feeling at the moment. He needed to lighten her mood. “Welcome to Stone Ranch, Nicole.”
She turned to him for a brief moment and sighed. Then she turned back to staring straight ahead.
“It’ll take us forty more minutes to get to our cabin.” Reed turned the wheel, navigating around the debris in the road. “We’re still cleaning up from a storm we had back in May. That was one helluva deluge. Most of the roads are back to normal. A few, like this one, still need work. Normally, the drive to our cabin would only take twenty minutes from here.”
Reed knew what he was doing, and that made Sawyer proud of him. She wasn’t a sub they needed to train, but she did need them. Keeping the conversation casual might help her to relax.
“Oh my God.” Nicole’s whole body seemed frozen with fear.
Her sudden outburst got his attention instantly, and his fingers unsnapped his gun’s holster.
“What?”
She pointed straight ahead. “What’s that?”
He looked in the middle of the road and saw the mountain lion he and Reed had learned to respect. Hell, they were even fond of the old girl. “That’s Connie.”
And then the big cat was gone.
“Odd for her to act that way,” Reed said.
He agreed. They’d only seen her a handful of times in the last five years and then only briefly. “I think she came to welcome Nicole.” He turned to Nicole only to find she was trembling. “Don’t worry about Connie. This was unusual for her to be on the road. She avoids humans.”
“She’s so…so beautiful.” Not only was Nicole sexy and beautiful and strong, but she was also obviously so, so passionate.
Sawyer had never met a woman like her before. A part of him stirred, but for the first time in his life, it wasn’t his cock. It was his heart.
Chapter Five
The creature’s gaze seemed to reach past all of Nicole’s walls and into her soul.
